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The ACLU of Rhode Island and the Right to Open Government

The public’s “right to know” is a critical right in a democratic society. In furtherance of that right, the R.I. ACLU has worked to make government more open and accountable. Listed below are several cases relating to open government in which the ACLU of Rhode Island has been involved over the years:

About this Case:
This is an Access to Public Records Act (APRA) lawsuit seeking a court order to force the Providence School District to release Department of Justice documents about the district's violation of federal law related to the rights of English Language Learners.

About This Case:
This is an appeal to the RI Supreme Court filed by ACLU of RI cooperating attorney Lynette Labinger on behalf of former House Minority Leader Patricia Morgan whose access to documents pertaining to the former Attorney General’s expenditure of more than $50M in funds from the “Google settlement” was stymied by hundreds of questionable redactions.

Current Status:
May 2019: In a letter to the ACLU, Attorney General Neronha’s office indicated they had reviewed all of the redacted documents initially provided Morgan and are now making public many of those documents in unredacted form.

Category: Discrimination Rights of the Poor Due Process Free Speech Open Government Women's Rights

About This Case:
This is a federal lawsuit against the City of Woonsocket for unlawfully withholding grant funds from Sojourner House, a social service agency that helps victims of domestic violence. The lawsuit alleges that the City withheld the funds without cause or due process, and then retaliated against the agency after it petitioned other government agencies for help in resolving the dispute over the funds.

About This Case:
This is a lawsuit filed in RI Superior Court against the Achievement First Mayoral Academy for failure to respond to requests from the ACLU for copies of its policy pertaining to the rights and protections afforded transgender students. The lawsuit argue that the school's failure to respond is a violation of the state's open records law.

About This Case:
This is an amicus brief in support of a federal lawsuit filed by the Providence Journal seeking a ruling on the constitutionality of Superior Court Associate Justice Netti Vogel’s controversial orders in April that initially blocked the release of the juror list, and barred members of the public from contacting the jurors, in a completed, high-profile murder case.

Category: Active Case Due Process Fair Administration of Justice Open Government Police Practices

About This Case:
This is a lawsuit in U.S. District Court against the RI State Police for abusing their power by retaliating against a Warwick resident who declined to serve as an informant for the agency in an ongoing criminal investigation. The lawsuit argues that RISP relied on a dubious state law to bar the plaintiff from continuing to work at the Twin River Casino in Lincoln when she bowed out of assisting RISP as an informant.

About This Case:
This is a series of legal actions over police departments' refusal to release reports of alleged police officer misconduct generated by their Internal Affairs Divisions (IAD).

A lawsuit, Lyssikatos v. King, filed on behalf of Dimitri Lyssikatos, a member of the Rhode Island Accountability Project, argues that the Pawtucket Police Department's refusal to release the records is a violation of the state’s Access to Public Records Act (APRA).

In a separate legal action, in July 2019, as a result of the Woonsocket Police Department's refusal to release similar records, the ACLU appealed to 1) the RI Supreme Court and 2) the Attorney General requesting that both bodies reverse a 2017 Attorney General decision that allows police to keep secret some of its reports of police misconduct. Woonsocket subsequently released the records in August 2019.

Current Status:
The ACLU of RI lawsuit against the Pawtucket Police Department is pending.

About This Case:
This is a "friend of the court" brief in R.I. Supreme Court in support of Governor Gina Raimondo's appeal for the release the grand jury records of the 38 Studios investigation. The ACLU of RI's brief argues that, while grand jury records should ordinarily be protected from disclosure, the 38 Studios investigation "presents a truly exceptional circumstance that justifies disclosure."

Current Status:
"Friend of the court" brief submitted in May 2018. In February 2020, the R.I. Supreme Court held that the records would be kept secret.

About This Case:
This is a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit demanding government documents about the on-the-ground implementation of President Trump's Muslim bans. Filed on behalf of six New England ACLU Affiliates, the lawsuit seeks records from the Boston field office of U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) related to CBP's implementation of President Trump's Muslim bans at T.F. Green, Bradley, Bangor, Burlington, Logan and Manchester airports.

About This Case:
This is a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit on behalf of a local journalist, Philip Eil, who for years has been stymied in his effort to obtain access to public evidence from a major prescription drug-dealing trial. The lawsuit, against the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), seeks a court order to release the documents and a declaration that the DEA has wrongfully withheld and redacted documents.

Current Status:
In September 2016, Judge McConnell ruled in Eil's favor and ordered the documents released. The defendents in the case have appealed.

This is an open records lawsuit against the Pawtucket School District for its failure to respond to an Access to Public Records Act (APRA) request relating to the district's wavier policy from the state "high stakes testing" requirement.

This is an open meetings lawsuit against the R.I. Board of Education over its plans in August of 2013 to meet in a private retreat, closed to the public and the media, in order to hear from invited “experts” on the issue of its “high stakes testing” requirement for high school seniors. The ACLU argued that allowing such a private meeting would significantly undermine the open meetings law’s purpose. In issuing a preliminary injunction against the planned private discussion of the issue, R.I. Superior Court Judge Daniel Procaccini agreed with the ACLU that allowing such a discussion to take place in private would significantly undermine the open meetings law’s purpose.

More information about the issue of high stakes testing can be found here.

This is a lawsuit in R.I. Superior Court over the R.I. Board of Education’s (BOE) failure to consider a petition filed by seventeen organizations to do away with the Board’s “high stakes testing” graduation requirement. The lawsuit argues that the Board had an obligation under state law, which it ignored, to consider the proposal and either reject it or initiate a formal rule-making process to consider its adoption.

2013: McBurney v. Young

Category: Open Government

“Friend of the court” brief in the U.S.Supreme Court on behalf of a Rhode Island resident challenging a Virginia law barring non-residents from invoking that state’s open records law. The court upheld the constitutionality of the statute.

This lawsuit charged that the Central Falls Receiver, Robert Flanders, Jr., unlawfully delegated to an appointed hearing officer powers that are afforded only to him under the state law authorizing his appointment. The lawsuit also argued that the receiver’s actions were a violation of the open meetings law, the Financial Stability Act, and residents’ rights to due to process and to petition their government. The suit was voluntarily dismissed after the City came out of receivership.

A lawsuit challenging the Division of Motor Vehicle’s actions in refusing to reinstate a person’s driver’s license based on a “policy” that appears nowhere in the agency’s rules and regulations. The lawsuit, filed in R.I. Superior Court on behalf of Warwick resident Marc Lavik, argues that the DMV’s actions are in violation of the Administrative Procedures Act (APA), an important state law that requires agencies to provide advance notice and a public comment period before adopting policies that affect members of the public.

Open meetings lawsuit challenging a school committee’s closed meeting to discuss a non-existent “Public Comment Lawsuit.” The suit was voluntarily dismissed after defendants averred that no discussion of the agenda item ever took place.

An Open Meetings Act (OMA) lawsuit against the Barrington School Committee for unlawfully meeting in closed session this past February to discuss the merits of instituting a mandatory breathalyzer policy for all students attending school dances.

The lawsuit was later expanded to include the further charge that the school committee, by using “vague boilerplate terminology, … routinely fails to specify the nature of the business to be discussed on public agendas,” and has also failed to provide adequate public notice of some of its meetings.

Federal lawsuit challenging the disqualification of a Mayoral candidate based on a city charter provision barring voters from signing more than one nomination paper for the same political office. The court ruled the provision unconstitutional, and the General Assembly enacted a law overriding similar requirements in other municipalities.

Lawsuit challenging a Gubernatorial executive order requiring all vendors and contractors doing business with the state to register with the federal government’s E-Verify work authorization program. A temporary restraining order was denied, but the executive order was subsequently rescinded and the suit was voluntarily dismissed as moot.

Open records lawsuit against the Governor for refusing to release documents relating to the chain of command for state governance during the Governor’s absence from the state. The court ordered immediate release of certain documents, and also awarded attorneys’ fees.

Open records lawsuit challenging a police department’s refusal to release a copy of the arrest report of car passengers who may have been victims of racial profiling. A day after the suit was filed, the defendants turned over the requested documents.

2005: Butterfield v. Gemma

Category: Open Government

Open records lawsuit challenging Town of North Smithfield’s requirement that a person provide his or her name and e-mail address in order to gain access to an on-line database of tax assessment records. The Town agreed to eliminate the requirement.

Cooperating Attorney: Karen Davidson

2005: R.I. ACLU v. Cirillo

Category: Open Government

Open records lawsuit against the Foster-Glocester School District for failing to respond to requests for copies of policies and forms governing the release of student directory information to military recruiters. The defendants turned over the documents the day after suit was filed, and the case was voluntarily dismissed after defendants agreed to a monetary settlement.

Cooperating Attorney: Karen Davidson

2003: Direct Action for Rights and Equality (DARE) v. Gannon

Category: Open Government Police Practices

Open records suit against the Providence Police Department for refusing to release internal records of police brutality complaints. In 2003 the R.I. Supreme Court affirmed a lower court ruling that the records were public and, in a second appeal, an order requiring defendants to turn over the records at no cost and to pay attorneys’ fees. After lengthy negotiations, an award of attorneys’ fees was made.

Cooperating Attorney: Dennis Grieco II

2002: In re: Providence Journal Company

Category: Open Government

“Friend of the court” brief filed in response to court’s refusal to publicly release various briefs submitted in the “Operation Plunder Dome” corruption case, asking appeals court to overturn the district court’s long-standing practice of not placing any court briefs in the public file. The appellate court overturned the no-filing policy.

2001: Brown v. Providence Police Department

Category: Open Government

Successful open records lawsuit challenging police department’s refusal to release copies of its policies governing the city’s use of video surveillance cameras in public street locations and in police cars.

1999: Solas v. Emergency Hiring Council of the State of Rhode Island

Category: Open Government

Successful lawsuit challenging the failure of the Governor’s Emergency Hiring Council to abide by the Open Meetings Law.

1997: Corbett v. City of Providence

1996: League of Women Voters of R.I. v. R.I. State Board of Elections

Category: Discrimination Rights of the Disabled Open Government Voting Rights

Favorably settled federal lawsuit requiring the state to take immediate action to fully comply with provisions of the National Voter Registration Act, including requiring the availability of voter registration services at state-funded agencies providing assistance to people with disabilities.

1996: Operation Clean Government v. Superior Court

Category: Open Government

Favorably settled suit challenging a court order sealing the identities of six public officials who had anonymously sued the Ethics Commission.

1995: Direct Action for Rights and Equality v. Gannon

Category: Open Government Police Practices

Successful open records lawsuit filed on behalf of a Providence community group seeking access to various city police department records relating to police brutality.

1990: Providence Journal Company v. Kane

Category: Open Government

“Friend of the court” brief challenging a Superior Court decision which held that, under the state’s Open Records Law, records relating to “personnel” are automatically and completely exempt from disclosure.

1988: Injured Workers of Rhode Island v. Rotondi

Category: Open Government

Favorably settled federal lawsuit on behalf of public interest group denied the right to take notes at Workers Compensation Commission hearings.

1985: Providence Journal Company v. RIHMFC

Category: Open Government

“Friend of the court” brief in Superior Court, successfully arguing that a state agency could not withhold from the public certain records simply because they had been subpoenaed by a grand jury.